The Knowledge Club

Chapter One-Page After Page

The pages of this book, marked The Knowledge Club: Rules and Regulations for Entry, are yellowed and so thin they are almost transparent with age. I turn over another one, and another, hoping to find something that was the least bit interesting. It's not like I have anything better to do than sit here and read this book, in all it's six inch thick glory. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let me take you back to the
beginning, when all this started.
It's the year 2354, and I'm 14.7 years old. 3.5 years ago, when I was 11.2 years old, an old man came up to me on my way to the Learning Center. He looked like he had been very wise in his day, but now he just looked crazy. I know it's not nice to say things like that, but it's true. He looked like he needed to be sent to an asylum of some kind, preferably far away from District 27, where I live. A light rain was falling, and his hair was sticking to his head in most places. I was wary, because I wasn't trained to fight anyone off. I'd had the choice to learn to be a soldier, but I'd chosen to be a scientist instead, a worthy profession in District 27. We have the best science department in all of Province 7. There aren't really any wars nowadays, but there's always the occasional person who goes rogue and wreaks havoc. They're usually men. Anyways, this old man was looking at me like there was no one else in the world, and I knew he was coming for me. He was moving slowly towards me and I considered running. It struck me as a good idea, and so I did. I ran in between the people, who were walking docilely along the streets, looking into shop windows and talking among themselves, weaving in and out like a snake. If I was good at using my head in a battle, I could be a soldier, but I have no common sense at all, so I was destined to pursue the gift of scientific knowledge.
I had expected the old man to fall far behind immediately, but when I looked back a while later, he was still tailing me at a steady pace. He didn't walk like an old man. His stride was long and purposeful, and he wasn't stooped, as I had previously thought. He was tall, more than six feet, and the government-issued black pants and pale tunic looked small on him, his black-socked ankles sticking out under the bottom and his wrists showing out the sleeves, displaying a series of shiny golden bracelets. I frowned. The people of Exitum, the country where we lived, rarely wore jewelry, and never made of precious metals like gold. 
The man was gaining on me, and I hurried to make up for my pause. I ducked into a bakery right around a corner so that the man wouldn't see me enter and took a moment to catch my breath. The smell of bagels entered my nostrils as I ventured deeper into the heart of the small pâtisserie. Neon lights, obsolete in most restaurants, glowed brightly, illuminating the people grouped around the small table, speaking in low tones in English and Latin, the two native languages of Exitum. Latin was once a forgotten language, they tell us, but after the War in 2143, they brought it back.
If you're wondering who "they" are, they're the government. They do everything for the benefit of the people, and because of them, peace reigns supreme, having been so for over 200 years. They were the ones who split the land more evenly after the War, and they renamed everything. They made learning much easier and now we can start work earlier to serve our country because we don't have to waste all the time on school. All the schools were demolished over a hundred years ago and they built Learning Centers in their places.
The bakery is my favorite haunt, being between the Learning Center and my own residence, where I live with 199 other teenagers and a staff of fifteen adults; two cooks, five cleaning ladies, three maids, four guards, and one laundry worker. Along our street, there are five such residences on each side, housing the entire teenage population of Area 7 of District 27. Each district has its own Learning Center, placed close enough to the residential streets to be convenient, but far enough away to give us exercise getting there. I enjoy the weekly walks, about two kilometers, but lots of people grumble about them.
Each area of District 27 is a small circle, about three kilometers across in all directions. The outside edge is fanned with a network of streets, with the residential streets on one side and the industrial streets on the other. On the industrial side is the Learning Center, where we get the week's information transferred into the chips that are planted inside our heads at ten years old. Alongside the Learning Center, there are businesses like bakeries and restaurants, and buildings that house the equipment for our industry.
Each area has its own industry, like they tell us countries used to, but now it's much more convenient. Area 7's industry is mushrooms. All along the industrial side of the area, dotted occasionally by bakeries and sweets shops, are long buildings devoted to growing the millions of tons of mushrooms that we ship out each year to the rest of the population of District 27. Mushrooms are a big part of our diet here. We put them in mostly everything; soup, salad, sandwiches, stew, buns, pasta, everything. We don't make our meals ourselves, of course. All the food gets delivered in packages to everyone's door, and all you have to do is warm it up on the government-issued double-burner stove that everyone has in their houses. In the teenage residences, that's what the cooks are for.

Because each area has its own industry, the districts are pretty much independent of each other. Except for a few things that aren't needed in huge supply, like pepper and paprika, the districts could all survive on their own even if all the other districts were gone. This saves a lot of money on transportation, too.
To my surprise, the "old" man had followed me into the bakery, and was looking around, searching for me with his eyes. Before he could see me, I ducked low and wove my way through the maze of legs and arms and managed to make my way to the door, bursting out into the street. Unfortunately, I had bumped into someone on my way out, and they had given a cry, causing me to stand up startled. The man had at once been riveted and I had hurried out, not worrying about running into people now. I ran down the cracked sidewalk, breathing heavily and with a stabbing pain in my gut, telling me that the extra serving of breakfast had not been a good idea.
The man was hot on my tail, and I could tell that he was not old now. He was jogging with ease, his long legs letting him keep up easily. I turned into an alley and ran down the narrow passage. It was dark, and I looked up to see that the roofs of the buildings overhead were almost touching. Only a thin strip of sky, not even big enough to show a cloud, illuminated the dusty alley.
I shot out the other side, my chest heaving, and looked around. I had no idea where I was. All the houses were exactly the same and the street I was standing in curved out of sight into the distance. Distracted by my distress, I didn't even notice the man behind me before he clapped a hand over my mouth and lifted me up, effectively binding me. He wave something, a handkerchief, in front of my nose, and I passed out.

"Qu'allons-nous faire avec lui?" French. I'm fluent now, but back then I only knew a tiny bit. "Ça fait trois jours, et il est encore endormi." I recognized the word endormi. Asleep. And encore. Still. They thought I was still asleep. Good.
"Je ne sais pas." Another, deeper voice. "Il est inutile de nous si jamais il ne se réveille." Inutile. Useless.

"Je le sais." The first voice again, this time it sounded weary. "Je pensais qu'il allait être d'une aide à la rébellion."  Rebellion? No one had said anything about a rebellion. Rebellion against who? "Il est notre seul espoir."  Espoir. Hope. Only hope. Was that me? I listened closely. The voices were getting quieter, as if the two men were moving away from me. I chanced opening my eyes.
I was lying on my left side, peering through my eyelashes into a small room, about five meters square. Under me, my support was a narrow board, with a coat balled up under my head to serve as a pillow. I shivered, cold, and realized that it was mine. The wool of the warm winter garment was rough against my head, but I didn't dare shift to relieve my chafed skin. Across the room sat the two men I had heard, seated at a small square table pushed up against the wall. The chairs which they occupied looked as if they were ready to fall apart, they were so old.

As I watched, one of the men turned to look at me, and I quickly shut my eyes completely, blocking out everything but the gravelly sound of his deep voice.

"Je pense qu'il est éveillé." He said, and I could hear his heavy footsteps on the floor as he approached my bed, or what passed for one. "Regardez, ses bras sont tendus."
"Oui, oui..." The other man replied thoughtfully. He seemed to bring his thoughts together, I could tell, even though my eyes were firmly shut. "Amenez-le avec nous." He said finally. "Nous allons voir le Puissant..."